“It’s pretty crazy. It hasn’t totally sunk in yet.”
John Catlin has three wins on the DP World Tour and four Asian Tour wins. But his latest feat is why his name will be known by more golfers now than ever.
Catlin, a 33-year-old American, shot 11-under 59 after holing a 20-foot eagle putt on the final hole Saturday at the Asian Tour’s International Series Macau event in China. He became the first player to break 60 in Asian Tour history, and his bogey-free performance helped him take the lead heading into the final round at Macau Golf & Country Club.
“Yeah, I’m pretty much speechless,” Catlin said, who later said all of his passwords end with 59. “It’s pretty crazy. It hasn’t totally sunk in yet. Wow. Yeah, the emotions are hitting me for sure. Just everything I’ve been through over the last two years. To be here. It’s pretty special.”
Catlin sits at 18 under for the tournament, beating LIV Golf’s Jason Kokrak by two shots. Kokrak and Lucas Herbert each shot 62 on the par-70 layout.
The purse is $2 million at the second International Series event of the year.
Adrich Potgieter, who won the Korn Ferry Tour’s Bahamas Great Abaco Classic two weeks ago, has now shot the 10th sub-60 round in Korn Ferry Tour history with his 11-under 59 during the second round of the Astara Golf Championship at the Pacos Course at Country Club de Bogata in Colombia.
Potgieter is the youngest player to shoot 59 in a PGA Tour-sanctioned event.
“I had to play well, I knew I had to play well to be able to shoot this low,” Potgieter said. “It was just kind of the confidence to hit the ball, get it close, make putts. Not many mistakes, I think that was a big thing, trying to eliminate the mistakes and just try to keep the ball in play. There’s not much danger on the short course, so just try to shoot under the 60s, try to get as low as I can, but definitely looking at that.”
The Pacos Course is the shortest on the Korn Ferry Tour, playing at 6,254 yards, as well as being nearly 9,000 feet above sea level. However, narrow fairways and tricky greens always create challenges for players, and there had never been a sub-60 score until Thursday.
And now, for the second straight day, a player has recorded a sub-60 round.
Potgieter went out in 7-under 28, playing the back nine at the Pacos Course. Then on the front, he added five more birdies, including three in a row on his final three holes, to shoot 59.
Ten birdies, one eagle and even a bogey, but it was enough to record the 12th sub-60 score in Korn Ferry Tour history. It’s also the first time there has been two sub-60 scores at one PGA Tour-sanctioned event.
Potgieter sits at 16-under 125 after two rounds in Colombia, one shot in front of Del Solar, who followed up his record-setting performance with a 2-under 69 on the Lagos Course.
“I was kind of trying to get to that 57, so I was trying to push myself, but then kind of realized that we’re still in a golf tournament, we’re not playing a fun round out here,” Potgieter said, “so I was kind of trying to concentrate when I made those last three birdies, which helped a lot.”
This weekend, play shifts to the Lagos Course for both rounds, a par-71 layout that measures 7,237 yards.
It’s one of the hardest things to achieve in the game.
The first one came in 1977.
It was another 14 years before someone did it again.
It was then eight years after that before it happened a third time.
Breaking 60 has always held mythical status in golf.
Al Geiberger (1977), Chip Beck (1991) and David Duval (1999) were the first three to pull it off.
Since 2010, there have been eight more PGA Tour golfers who shot a 59, including Jim Furyk, who also shot a record-setting 58 from in 2016. He remains the only golfer to shoot a 58 on Tour and he’s the only golfer to break 60 twice.
Bryson DeChambeau joined the 58 Club after his 12-under round in a LIV Golf event.
Scottie Scheffler is the latest to break 60 on the PGA Tour, shooting a 59 in the second round of the 2020 Northern Trust. It’s the 12th time that a Tour golfer broke 60.
On the LPGA, there has only been one 59. It came in 2001 and was accomplished by Annika Sorenstam.
Joaquinn Niemann’s 59 in the 2024 LIV opener made him the second on that circuit to do it.
And in 2024, a golfer on the Korn Ferry Tour became the first to shoot 57 in a PGA Tour-sanctioned event.
Here’s a closer look at the sub-60 rounds in pro golf.
Chan Kim went bogey-free for 72 holes at the 2023 Albertsons Boise Open and won on the Korn Ferry Tour for the second week in a row. Kim went 66-62-64-64 to get to 28 under after four days at Hillcrest Country Club and still left himself little room for error considering what David Kocher did Sunday.
Kocher drained a long birdie putt on the 18th hole for a 59, amazingly the third 59 on the Korn Ferry Tour this season.
Kocher had 10 birdies – including six straight on Nos. 2 through 7 – and an eagle to get to 12 under for the day and 26 under for the week.
Kocher joins Mac Meissner, who posted a 59 at the Lecom Suncoast Classic at Lakewood National’s Commander Course in Lakewood Ranch, Florida, in April. That was the eighth sub-60 round in Korn Ferry Tour history.
Michael Feagles had the circuit’s ninth 59 at the BMW Charity Pro-Am in Greer, South Carolina, in June.
Now there’s a 10th, and a third in four months, thanks for Kocher.
Chan Kim celebrates on the 18th green after winning the the 2023 Albertsons Boise Open at Hillcrest Country Club in Boise, Idaho. (Photo: Alex Goodlett/Getty Images)
As for Kim, he’s the first back-to-back winner in two years. Cameron Young and Mito Pereira each did it on the KFT in 2021.
His last seven holes a week ago were also bogey free, so Kim has actually played 79 consecutive holes without a bogey. He’s the first to win and go bogey-free at the Albertsons.
To the winner goes the spoils, as Kim, second on the Korn Ferry Tour Points List, has also earned his PGA Tour card for the 2024 season.
The Albertsons Boise Open is the first of four events in the season-ending Korn Ferry Tour Finals.
“I mean, definitely a little bit shocked right now.”
Heading into Friday’s second round at the Lecom Suncoast Classic, Mac Meissner was facing a missed cut.
Eighteen holes later, he’s in the record books.
Meissner carded a 12-under 59 during the second round at Lakewood National’s Commander Course in Lakewood Ranch, Florida, the eighth sub-60 round in Korn Ferry Tour history. He vaulted more than 100 spots up the leaderboard and was only four shots behind leader Kevin Daugherty after the morning wave.
“Based on how yesterday went, I didn’t expect today to go as it did,” Meissner said. “Didn’t hit it great, did not putt very well. I was hoping I could just sneak in the cut and ended up shooting 59. I mean, definitely a little bit shocked right now. That’s my first one ever, and to do it in competition is pretty insane.”
History was made at the LECOM Suncoast Classic 😳
Mac Meissner became just the eighth Korn Ferry Tour member to shoot a sub-60 round. pic.twitter.com/AE5OQhHrRB
The 24-year-old from Charleston, South Carolina, lost in a playoff against Sam Saunders and Pierceson Coody in Panama earlier this year, and his best round of the season coming in was a 67.
In fact, Saunders was the last person to shoot in the 50s on the Korn Ferry Tour, coming in 2017 at the Tour Championship.
His day started on the back nine, where he birdied two of his first three holes and then three of his last four to turn in 5-under 30. Meissner started the back nine with a pair of pars before birdieing four straight. After a par on 16, he went birdie-eagle to card a 7-under 29 on the back and signed for a 59.
“I’ve had a few 61s, a 60, so been around there, but actually never had a putt for 59,” Meissner said. “That was cool to have one on 18, or on 9. It was kind of a tough putt and I just made a good-sized one on 8 and I was like, ‘Why not?’ It rolled in right in the middle, that was pretty crazy.”
Meissner sits tied for third at 12 under par with Chris Gotterup after the morning wave.
Heading into Saturday, Meissner hopes he can continue the momentum.
“Yesterday I made two birdies, didn’t hit — hit it to a bunch of fringes, just felt like I was close, couldn’t really get the ball on the right side of the hole,” he said. “I just kind of shot a really average even par round out here. That just goes to show you that every day’s different. You wake up, you never know what can happen. I’m just super fortunate to be able to do this in a tournament.”
The eagle putt for 59 was good. The celebration was even better.
Michael Caan made a splash on Friday.
An aspiring professional golfer and PGA of Canada teaching pro at Riverway Golf Course in Burnaby, Caan produced a viral moment by making a long putt for eagle on his final hole at Meadow Gardens Golf Club in Pitt Meadows, British Columbia. But the putt wasn’t just an impressive big bird from distance, it was for a 59.
The celebration — a dive into the greenside pond — was even better than the putt.
“To non-golfers this number won’t mean much, but if you know.. then you know,” wrote Caan on an Instagram post with the video of the putt. “This could be my only chance to ever shoot 59 and it was one of the best golfing experiences of my life. I’m so happy to have done this with a great group of guys: @jpkahlert @ethanp.5 and @eriklaw. Thank you guys for capturing a life long memory! #59”
https://www.instagram.com/p/CO4N3B_ikBr/
Caan later shared a picture of his scorecard, which featured five birdies on the front nine and four more on the back, alongside two eagles on Nos. 11 and 18.
https://www.instagram.com/p/CO5bjztMf5P/
The 27-year-old signed up for Mackenzie Tour Q-School this year, but qualifying was moved to the U.S. In the meantime, Caan plays locally on the Vancouver Golf Tour.
On March 16, 2001, Annika Sorenstam became the first player in LPGA history to shoot 59 at the Standard Register Ping. Sorenstam’s longtime caddie, Terry McNamara, took Golfweek hole-by-hole through the yardage book from that magical day at Moon Valley Country Club in Phoenix. What follows are excerpts from that conversation, edited for length.
Our warmup was terrible. Annika was late. Actually, I was late and worried about it. I was only staying a mile-and-a-half away at my uncle’s and I got up very early, and for some reason I dilly-dallied around. All of a sudden, I had to be there in five minutes. Luckily my aunt drove me down the hill and dropped me off. I grabbed a doughnut and a coffee.
Yardage book from Moon Valley Country Club, site of Annika Sorenstam’s round of 59 on March 16, 2001. (Photo submitted)
I got out there thinking Annika would be there and she wasn’t … which happened never. That may have been the only time until 2008 (when she retired) that she was ever late.
Anyway, her warmup was really bad on the range. I remember a TV crew trying to shoot behind her. She moved, slammed her club down. Walking through the parking I said, ‘What’s up?’
‘Oh, I was running late, couldn’t get out of the house, this and that.’
Dottie Pepper was leading, I remember. … I knew we had to shoot a pretty good score to get up by the leaders. We had a talk walking through the parking lot, just go through the locker room there and sit down a minute, catch your breath. I’ll meet you on the putting green and then we’ll go do it.
Scottie Scheffler posted the historic number on Friday at TPC Boston for the Northern Trust, rocketing up the leaderboard in the process.
Add another 59 to the PGA Tour record books. Scottie Scheffler logged the iconic number at TPC Boston on Friday in the second round of the Northern Trust.
Scheffler’s round of 12-under 59 came after an opening 1-under 70. He rocketed more than 70 spots up the leaderboard, into the solo lead at 13 under.
The former Texas player’s first birdie came at the par-5 second hole. He added birdies at Nos. 4, 5, 6, 7 and 9 to turn in 30, then kept it going on the back with birdies at Nos. 10, 11, 14, 15 and 16. For the final birdie on No. 18, he faced just more than 4 feet. He drained it make history.
It’s the 12th sub-60 score in PGA Tour history. Kevin Chappell was the last player to accomplish the feat at The Greenbrier in 2019.
Seth Fair had a 59 at the Ulen Open in Indiana despite hitting a ball out of bounds.
Seth Fair struck a 4-iron to 4 feet on the par-3 17th hole at Ulen Country Club in Lebanon, Indiana, and drained the putt for birdie. On the cart ride to the 18th tee, he turned to his buddy, Michael Davan, and said: “We’re just going to go ahead and talk about it. I need to make another birdie.”
A birdie on the 18th would give Fair an 11-under 59 at the Ulen Open, a rather remarkable feat given the fact that he’d piped a drive out of bounds on the third hole.
Fair, 33, found the fairway, knocked a wedge to 15 feet and poured in the putt.
“Probably one of the best feelings I’ve had in my golf career,” he said. “It is kind of crazy to say that I shot 59 with a ball out bounds.”
Fair’s friends went nuts on the 18th. They tried to tell some buddies going off in the afternoon wave that Fair had posted 59.
“They kept driving like, ‘yeah, right’ ” said Fair. “Then they hit the brakes. Really?”
Seth Fair’s 59 card (photo submitted).
Fair, a 2010 University of Indianapolis grad, has full status on the PGA TOUR Latinoamérica, which was canceled this season due to COVID-19. He didn’t play in a tournament from March to mid-June and then got going on the new Tour Red circuit, winning four events around the Midwest. In late June he won the Metropolitan Open in St. Louis.
“Seth was a very mature player in college,” said Indy coach Brent Nicoson. “He learned early in his career when to attack pins and when to play the smart sides, which made him very consistent and very successful.”
It’s about a 15-minute ride from Fair’s house in Whitestown, Indiana, to Ulen County Club in Lebanon. Twice this year the Ulen Open had been postponed. First because of COVID-19 and then due to rain.
The field was smaller than usual, but Fair knew it would be a fun day among friends. He’d just teed it up in a charity event the day before and the perspective of playing for a cause had refreshed his attitude.
“There are things out in the world and life that are bigger than my golf score,” said Fair. “I kind of just had that mindset (at Ulen), just go and enjoy myself and have fun.”
Wednesday’s round started out with a 12-foot birdie putt left short in the heart. After draining a 30-footer for birdie on the second hole, Fair rifled one “right of right” out of bounds on the third hole. He made a 20-footer to save bogey, thinking it could’ve been worse.
After taking an aggressive line over the trees on the short par-4 fourth, he flubbed his approach from 40 yards, only to make a 30-footer for birdie.
“Guys, I think this is just going to be a weird round,” Fair told his playing competitors.
Weirdly fantastic.
Because the event changed dates twice, the field size was smaller than usual. Fair earned $800 for his winning efforts and celebrated back home with a glass of champagne with his wife.
“They could’ve not paid me anything,” said Fair, “and I wouldn’t have cared.”
